State Dept Spokeshole On Whether Saudi Arabia Should Be on Human Rights Council: “We’re Just Observers”

A State Department spokesman on Wednesday declined to give an opinion on whether Saudi Arabia should be suspended from the U.N. Human Rights Council over its widely-criticized rights record, on the grounds that the U.S. is “just an observer.”

“Because we only have observer status,” Mark Toner told a briefing in response to questions about calls for the kingdom’s suspension, “I’d refer you to the U.N. for more details. I mean, we don’t have a vote.”

A vote to suspend a member of the Geneva-based HRC would be taken not by that body but by the U.N. General Assembly in New York – at which the U.S. and the other 192 U.N. members have a vote.

But asked whether the U.S. would favor a vote in the General Assembly to suspend Saudi Arabia, Toner said, “I don’t think we would talk about our vote before that happened – before the vote took place. But nice try.”….